FirefightingSeismic networks can serve as the backbone for 21st century firefighting

Published 19 May 2016

The same twenty-first century communications network used for real-time seismic monitoring in Nevada and parts of California can provide high-quality images to help first responders catch fires before they grow costly and dangerous. Experts say that seismic networks in place to provide earthquake early warning, if designed to sustain multi-hazard monitoring, can provide a robust data backbone for fire cameras that pan, tilt and zoom as they monitor wildfires and other extreme weather events like remote floods.

On the YouTube video, the fire appears first as a small white dot among the trees, then as an unmistakable wisp of smoke curling up over a ridgeline. Wilderness high-definition (HD) cameras have caught the spark of a lightning strike in the Tahoe Basin, and are transmitting this time-lapsed live view to firefighters via a network built to detect earthquakes.

The same twenty-first century communications network used for real-time seismic monitoring in Nevada and parts of California can provide high-quality images like that of the Tahoe strike to help first responders catch fires before they grow costly and dangerous, says Graham Kent, director of the Nevada Seismological Laboratory (NSL) and professor in seismology at the University of Nevada, Reno.

SSA reports that Kent was the featured public policy speaker at the Seismological Society of America’s (SSA) 2016 Annual Meeting held 20-22 April in Reno, Nevada. He said that seismic networks in place to provide earthquake early warning, if designed to sustain multi-hazard monitoring, can provide a robust data backbone for fire cameras that pan, tilt and zoom as they monitor wildfires and other extreme weather events like remote floods. And for Kent, the project is a bit personal: he’s had two homes-one in California and one in Nevada-burned over or threatened by wildfires.

The dual system has already been a success throughout parts of Nevada and eastern California, Kent said in a recent interview. During last year’s fire season in the state, the AlertTahoe platform and another platform in north-central Nevada helped to discover or provide early intelligence on more than twenty-five fires. This summer, AlertTahoe and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) wildland fire camera programs will add fifteen to twenty new HD cameras to increase its coverage of these areas.

According to Kent, the technology has the potential to remake firefighting in the West, moving away from massive “war-like” operations to more tactical suppression. “The old style of firefighting is like storming the beach at Normandy,” he said, “but if you can get on a fire early, with special tools, then it becomes more like a Special Forces situation.”